


Before You Go

by dykeannebonny, ThirdActLove



Series: Queers of Tomorrow [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Canon Related, Coma, Fix-It, Friends to Lovers, Harrisco Fest, Harrisco Fest 2020, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 10:07:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24848041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dykeannebonny/pseuds/dykeannebonny, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThirdActLove/pseuds/ThirdActLove
Summary: When Cisco is injured during a mission, Harry is forced to reevaluate his permanent departure from Earth-1.
Relationships: Cisco Ramon/Earth-2 Harrison "Harry" Wells
Series: Queers of Tomorrow [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1797535
Comments: 8
Kudos: 74





	1. I was getting used to being someone you loved

**Author's Note:**

> *shows up 6 years late to The Flash fandom with Jitters* Anyone want some Harrisco?
> 
> Comments and kudos are always appreciated. Enjoy!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Cisco is injured during a mission, Harry is forced to reevaluate his permanent departure from Earth-1.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shows up 6 years late to The Flash fandom with Jitters* Anybody want some Harrisco?
> 
> Comments and kudos are always appreciated. Enjoy!

Cisco's brain was still lagging, hanging on the threads of Harry's _Wrath of Khan_ quote, miles away from being convinced that this was it, that Harry wasn't coming back. He turned to Barry, mouth open for words that he couldn't form. His brain cycled through four other words.

_I love you, too._

As last words went, they were good ones--great ones, even. Cisco had opened his heart as much as he was able, and Harry had one-upped him one last time. Harry was also about to disappear to Earth-2 without giving Cisco the chance to really say it back.

Cisco stared into the empty space where Harry had just been. His skin tingled where Harry’s hand had touched his, and he didn’t want to move in case it vanished.

It took all of ten seconds for Barry to slap Cisco's shoulder and exclaim forcefully, " _Dude!_ "

"Why are you still standing here?" Iris insisted, arms crossed and lips pursed like Cisco was the most clueless person in the multiverse.

Cisco blinked. "It's the end of an era. Can't a man process-?!"

" _No!_ " Came the resounding, unified answer from all his teammates; Barry's voice was tinted with laughter, Iris' with encouragement, Caitlin's a hint of sadness. They shoved Cisco forward until his feet carried him out of the door.

In his mind, his arms were still around Harry.

_I love you, too._

_I love you, too._

"I love you!" Cisco shouted down the corridor. Only it came out so quietly Cisco barely heard it over the rushing in his ears. His eyes drilled a spot between Harry's shoulder blades, but Harry kept walking, kept moving on. Cisco wondered briefly who had turned off the oxygen in the lab before he collapsed against the wall, shoulder first, head second. White flashed behind his eyelids and he groaned.

"I love you." Cisco repeated it softly, desperately, as he slid down to the concrete floor. He shoved his face into his hands, then balled one hand into a fist and threw it back into the wall. It connected with a reverberating bang that ground straight into his bones. " _ Ow _ ."

Those retreating footsteps slowed, then stopped, then swiveled.

"Ramon," Harry grunted. Soft 'I love you' Harry had reverted back to Gruff Harry in about a minute. Cisco figured it had to be a record.

Gruff Harry, however, would not be jogging toward Cisco with shining eyes and a locked jaw. Gruff Harry would not be sweeping Cisco into his arms in a move straight out of the _Search for Spock_. But instead of fire and an earthquake, it was just the excruciating stillness of being alone that Harry was rescuing Cisco from.

They folded into one another on the floor. Cisco inhaled sharply and Harry's finger ghosted above Cisco’s mouth, then across his jaw, before settling against his neck. He pressed their foreheads together. Each breath he took pulled one away from Cisco.

"I want," Cisco managed, voice thick. He cleared his throat. "I want you to stay. Here. With me. Not just with Team Flash," Cisco gestured vaguely down the hallway before pulling his arm back. He tapped Harry's chest, then his own. "With _me_."

Harry sighed and something unwound in the back of Cisco's throat. He shuddered, surging forward. Harry turned. Their cheeks brushed; Harry curled his hand and held Cisco's face between his neck and shoulder as Cisco fell into him, tears streaming steadily down.

Cisco gritted his teeth. "You don't have to tell me how selfish it is. How selfish I am. I just need you to know."

It was worse that Harry said nothing. He held Cisco, he breathed, he tucked loose strands of hair behind Cisco's ears, and he said nothing.

They stood together--or, maybe Harry picked Cisco off the floor, or maybe Cisco pulled Harry with him. They were a tangle of limbs moving with no other purpose than to move. When Harry let Cisco go, Cisco felt the phantom of his embrace until Harry was out of sight.

The problem with phantom pain was that it lingered.

It was also _nagging_. Everything Cisco touched gave him flashes of Harry. He drank extraordinary amounts of champagne at the party that evening, wedged in the corner and nursing his heartache. Each “I’m fine” he tossed toward his concerned friends turned to excuses--finally having a chance to process Gypsy, residual anxiety from DeVoe, anything, _anything_ but Harry Wells.

Even before the alcohol set in, Cisco couldn’t have even attempted to put into words what he felt in a way that wouldn’t have Caitlin running psych tests on him. There was no casual way to explain he was pretty sure Harry was his soulmate, even though that wasn’t a thing, and drift compatibility was just something out of a kaiju movie, not real life, and it wasn’t like Caitlin had even seen _Pacific Rim_ , and it was absurd to think that within 53 worlds there was really only _Harry_ \--

Cisco did manage to find his way to the bathroom before vomiting. Barry found Cisco, held his hair back, and consoled him about Gypsy. Everyone gave him sympathetic looks when he emerged, and there was a group hug that should have made Cisco happy but just had him reaching for the missing person.

The next thing Cisco knew, he was in bed in his apartment and there was a cold glass of water on the nightstand. He didn’t dream. At least, he didn’t dream the first time he slept. That deep slumber was rudely interrupted by a sprint to the bathroom to throw up the rest of the champagne and cake--not a tasty combination, turns out. After that disaster, Cisco tossed himself back into bed for a fitful, fevered mess of nightmares.

They were all stupidly vivid fantasies of a life with Harry, and they ended in similar ways every night for the next week: Harry leaving or dying or killing Cisco. That one was particularly screwed up, and Cisco had needed 3 Killer Frosts to get through the following morning.

He worked in his own lab like a man possessed. Caitlin, Barry, Iris, and Nora tried desperately to draw him away. Sure, Cisco completed his tasks and went on missions, but he felt like he was just going through the motions. As it started to become routine, it also became a sort of blissful normal.

That is, until he needed a very specific screwdriver that he didn’t have in his lab. Which meant it was in _Harry’s_ lab, a place Cisco preferred to call The Lab Who Must Not Be Named--abbreviated to ”Whose lab?” whenever accidentally someone called it “Harry’s.”

The project could wait. Cisco slammed his unfinished work on the table, stood, and clasped his hands behind his neck. Cisco then proceeded to do the mopiest, post-not-breakup-breakup thing he could do.

He looked through pictures of the one that got away.

Harry’s smile, scowl, and smirk constantly graced the STAR labs security footage. Cisco scrolled through his desktop, minimizing and maximizing, lingering or swiping quickly from one file to the next. There were so many amazing candids that he started to comprise a folder of the best. After a couple hours, he sent a batch to the printer.

Cisco couldn’t be in Harry’s lab alone. If he brought some Harrys with him, however, he thought he might have a fighting chance.

Armed with precisely 22 glossy papercut hazards, Cisco braved the stairs. It was difficult to tell if his arms or breath shook more, but with each step, the nerves worsened. When Cisco hit the final step, and then the floor, they melted away altogether.

Closing his eyes, Cisco leaned against the lab door. The metal was cool and calming against his sweaty forehead. With a final, deep inhale, he laid his fingers on the handle and pushed down.

Harry’s lab was untouched.There was a half-finished equation on the board. Markers were strewn across the floor where they’d been tossed and never retrieved. Cisco kind of felt like his heart was down there with them.

Shuffling to the workbench, he deposited his pile--gaggle? Host of?--Harrys on the surface. They spilled out in a splendor of memories. And instead of looking for the screwdriver like he was supposed to, Cisco sorted them in chronological order.

“Cisco! I haven’t seen you down here in awhile!”

Caitlin’s perky voice knocked Cisco into reality. His body creaked, reminding him he’d been stuck in the same position for an hour. Stiff muscles had nothing on the painful pounding of his heart as Caitlin tried to look around him.

“So, what are you doing?”

Cisco fluffed his own hair and laughed, swaying so he could hide the workbench with his body. Caitlin frowned. Her heel tap-tap-tapped on the concrete floor. Cisco was _super_ busted.

"Do those holograms ever… wear out?" she asked, voice too high as she played innocent.

Cisco gave a non-committal "hmm" as he quietly swept photographs into an open drawer.

"You _are_ looking at Gypsy holograms."

Forceful laughter tumbled from Cisco's mouth. "Haa-what? No. Nope. Juuuust working on the meta. Case. Stuff. Thing."

Caitlin peered at him. When she stepped closer, Cisco stopped hiding photos, worried the movement might draw her eye. There were still a few candids left in the pile--Harry smiling, Harry scribbling on the board, Harry mid-yell at Cisco--and all of them were taking all of his focus from the case. Moping Cisco was a useless Cisco. Caitlin was probably in the lab to scold him.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine," Cisco lied. He flailed his arm as Caitlin walked forward. His heart leapt with guilt while her face dripped with concern. He sighed. "I miss him a lot, okay!"

Caitlin halted mid-step and tilted her head. She gasped a little, brown hair floating across her cheekbones with the breath.

"Him."

It wasn't a question, but Cisco was already answering _no, no, whoops--_

Except he wasn't. He slumped against the workbench, eyes burning. "Yeah, him." The words spilled out in unison with the tears. Backing away, he brandished his arm like the most depressing showman ever so Caitlin could get a closer look at all the printouts.

She used one hand to flip through the glossy paper and the other she placed on Cisco's forearm, squeezing, soothing.

"For what it's worth," Caitlin said after a while, "I think he cared about you a lot, too."

Cisco jammed his fists in his eyes, begging the waterworks to stop already so he could talk to his best friend about… whatever Harry was… but his phone was blasting a meta-human alarm. He’d never been so grateful for imminent danger.

The danger posed turned out to be more to artifacts than civilians. Team Flash’s meta alert brought them back to the same museum loading dock Null had targeted--unsurprisingly, given the questionable security staffing choices--and a thief with an entirely different M.O. No stealth at all, just a big hunk of person encased in a thick shell of tungsten. CCPD’s bullets were useless.

Team Flash’s plan was a straightforward one: Cisco would lure the meta off the dock, Nora would distract them, and Barry would phase through the armor shell to apply the power-dampening cuffs.

No one, however, had planned for the failsafe bomb in the getaway van.

Cisco was backed against the vehicle and avoiding a wicked left hook when he heard ticking. In the reflection of the rear window, he watched the bad guy flick the trigger, a maniacal grin on that metal face.

Everything was too fast and Team Flash was _too slow._ Cisco felt like he was back in Speed Force time. Barry screamed his name and stared in abject horror as the bomb’s light switched from green to red in a devastating instant. There were orange lights beyond Cisco’s hands, bright flashes of too-saturated colors, a low rumbling--

The van exploded and Cisco flew across the loading dock. His head cracked against the wall with a sickening crunch, radiating pain through his skull and down his spine. Then, everything went black.


	2. I’ll be safe in your sound till I come back around

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We forgot to mention in the other notes, but all the chapter titles are quotes from the songs 'Before You Go' and 'Someone You Loved' by Lewis Capaldi! Give him a listen!

Cisco was drowning. He couldn't feel any water, but it was the only explanation for the cold and the echo and the way his friends were swimming in and out of his head.

_Wait_.

Slowly, more of life registered in Cisco's brain. That was the only part of him that was working, it seemed; his arms and legs were weighed down and immobile, and he couldn't open his eyes. Machines beeped in the background. Voices murmured underneath them. If Cisco concentrated hard enough--son of a breach, that hurt-- he could differentiate between them.

"It's--the line changed, is he awake?" Barry asked. The tone echoed and shifted.

A warped reply came from Caitlin, but Cisco had a killer migraine that obscured it. He tried to assess the damage. Nausea came in waves. He was breathing on his own, though with a lot of effort, and his head hurt like it’d gone a round with King Shark. Had he?

No. Sifting through the memories was a losing battle of grasping at sand, but he remembered the bomb. His mouth was clean, yet he could still taste the smoke and metal. At least the injuries stopped there. No broken bones meant a much faster recovery.

_Wake up wake up wake up WAKE UP!_

Nothing happened. It was worth a shot, Cisco reasoned. He relaxed more, confident that his teammates were already on their way to a brilliant solution. Letting their voices fade back in, Cisco felt his heart lift as it recognized people he cared about.

Barry scoffed. Cisco vibed frustration, anxiety. He tried pushing past those emotions, because they were clearly his own, except that they weren’t. _Barry_ was that upset, which was kind of comforting until Barry said, “We don’t need Harry.”

“They have a strong connection,” Caitlin argued calmly. “I think Harry could be our best shot.”

“He can’t help with the science, right? Cisco’s brain is broken, not his heart.” Ralph, coming in with the poetry. Cisco could have strangled him.

Fingers tapped rapidly on a keyboard. Caitlin swung the monitor around, explaining, “From what we’ve hypothesized concerning coma patients, one could heal the other.”

“No,” Barry replied in a very final way. “Jesse needs him right now. We had Harry almost this whole year; we shouldn’t pull him away. Cisco has people who love him, he has us.” Fabric rustled against fabric as Barry threw his jacket back on. “Sorry, Caitlin. It was a good idea, but my vote’s still no.”

Everyone except Caitlin filtered out. She floated around the medbay, typed more notes, and wrote some others. Finally, she stopped close to Cisco, brushed his hair out of his face, and whispered, “I’m calling Harry.”

Cisco didn’t like to be alone with his thoughts in an empty room. When Caitlin left, Cisco got very cold even while his heart slammed restlessly against his ribcage. He willed himself back to sleep. He willed a little harder. Eventually, it worked.

There was too much noise for half-asleep-Cisco’s liking. Adrenaline flooded his system as his brain lurched back into gear, dialing all his working senses up about 1000%. By then, his heart was racing for an entirely different reason because he knew there could only be one person banging around like that.

“Harry!” Iris’ voice was colored with shock. “Wow. I did not know mousepads were so aerodynamic.”

“What are you two doing here?” Caitlin whisper-yelled at the West-Allens, following it with a _shush_ that had major kindergarten teacher energy.

Barry whined about ruined date night for a little before answering. “We got a breach alert!” He sighed, making his way toward medbay with the team. “Shoulda known it was Harry.”

“And I should have been told sooner!” Harry barked. There was more scuffling and shouting.

A new, colder voice joined the fray. “That is Caitlin’s patient and your friend. You can all keep fighting like children but it won’t be in here.”

The silence crackled with unease. Harry broke it first; his footsteps grew louder until they stopped at Cisco’s bedside. A word caught in his throat. Hitting the bed’s safety bar, Harry asked, “Why isn’t he waking up?” He stared down at Cisco from where he loomed over his prone body. When nobody answered, Harry repeated the question louder, and Cisco could feel the tension in the room burst.

Iris huffed and left. Barry followed. Caitlin flinched, brushed her hair back, and stayed.

“Harry, you know why--” Caitlin stopped herself. Her voice was softer when she continued, “Cisco experienced a Traumatic Brain Injury when he was thrown against the wall from the bomb blast. His brain tissue is swollen, there was severe bleeding--his skull is fractured, Harry.”

“Mm.” Harry inhaled as if someone had struck him.

Cisco listened as Caitlin moved closer to Harry. She murmured, “Keeping him in that coma is keeping him alive.”

“Mm,” The sound was a little less strained that time. The air altered with their movement. Reaching for Caitlin’s hand, he dropped it halfway and curled it into a fist so he could bounce it on the mattress. Cisco heard and felt the plastic cover shift. He wanted to yell at Harry to stop it, but his mouth was shut tight despite his thoughts screaming.

“You can look at his file--”

“Can he hear m--us?” Harry interrupted.

Caitlin explained the recent theories on cognizance during comas. Cisco, exhausted by his attempts to join the conversation, drifted off to sleep while she spoke. When he swam back to semi-consciousness again, Caitlin was gone.

Cisco was slowly training himself to fill up the room with what he remembered--sights, sounds, smells--while also recognizing anything new without relying on his sight. The first thing that registered besides the morphine-numbed ache in his head was the body next to the bed. Cisco would know the touch of Harry’s hand anytime.

_The touch of his what now?_

Cisco heard the monitor beep as his heart rate increased, and it took Harry’s hand away. Willing his brain to stop shrieking and focus for a single second, Cisco got his pulse down to a steady hum, and warm fingers intertwined with his own. Harry was holding Cisco’s hand. He tried to smile, realized he couldn’t, and settled on some good old-fashioned listening.

Many times, Cisco had imagined being this close to Harry. Ideally, he’d be awake to experience it all: Harry’s furrowed brows, the way he’d hang his head. Cisco wanted to squeeze his hand and tell him he was alright. Slightly awake was partially alive, after all.

Harry leaned over to rest his forehead on their hands. Later, he turned his cheek, lips grazing Cisco’s knuckles, to whisper, “I was wrong about the balance. You gave me too much heart.”

Time didn’t pass differently in Cisco’s comatose state, but he did lose most days as his brain kept dragging him back to sleep. Harry was a constant presence at Cisco’s bedside. The first couple days, Harry would stop touching Cisco when another person was near. He’d become agitated, tense, rubbing his palms on his jeans while Caitlin ran tests or Barry chatted with Cisco about the latest meta.

“You don’t have to stay,” Caitlin told Harry one evening.

“Yes, I do.”

“Well I’m sure he appreciates the company.” Caitlin wrote on a clipboard, pretending not to look at Harry. “It’s my theory that touch is a positive motivator for revival, you know. Like you’re pulling him out of it.”

By the end of the week, Harry’s hand was a consistent, pleasant pressure in Cisco’s hand. 

Waking up without it was inevitable, but it didn’t make it easier when the time came. Cisco would have bolted upright if he could. Instead, he was stuck in bed, heart racing, the EKG judging him pretty harshly from his left.

Cisco expected to hear Barry’s erratic _whoosh_ or Caitlin’s deliberate steps; obviously they’d sent Harry away for proper sleep and nutrition and shouldn’t that make Cisco happy, shouldn’t he worry about Harry’s health, too?

Harry rushed into the medbay, two wrong moves away from spilling his coffee. He managed to save the mug--Cisco heard it clank down on the counter--before he was grabbing Cisco’s hand and pulling it toward him to kiss Cisco’s palm.

“I’m here,” Harry growled, more to the monitor than to Cisco. Once the machine resumed its normal, placated buzz, Harry sighed and sat. “You were asleep. I thought--dammit.” He stood again. Slowly extracting himself from Cisco, Harry said, “Let me just...”

Cisco trusted him. He waited. A moment later, Harry climbed into bed with him. The mattress groaned as Harry sank into it gradually, avoiding the various wires and tubes connected to Cisco’s body. It took a lot of rearranging, and the sensation of being moved while being completely unable to move himself made Cisco dizzy.

The minor discomfort was a small price to pay for the warmth of Harry’s chest at his back, his hands around his shoulders, face pressing into Cisco’s neck. His skin was hot like he was blushing. Harry Wells,  _ blushing.  _ Cisco really hoped there was photographic evidence of that somewhere.

“Now... I know you have a rule against people touching your hair,” Harry started, his voice low and apologetic. “But you’ll have to make an exception right now, because I think you’d faint if you saw this _Charlotte’s Angels_ situation going on here.” He pressed an object against Cisco’s temple.

Panic swelled in Cisco’s chest. Yet within seconds, it abated, soothed away by a hairbrush gently pulling through all those tangles. Harry worked the bristles against Cisco’s scalp and down. The movement was smooth, deft, confident. Once Harry had carefully untangled every knot, he set the brush aside and ran his fingers through Cisco’s curls distractedly, easily, like he was just tapping a pen as he worked out equations in his head. He told Cisco of his experiments since his return to Earth-2 to re-acquire his intelligence. Cisco had suggestions and recommendations, but they faded out like white noise as he zeroed in on the rhythm of Harry’s fingers sliding through his hair.

Cisco lost track of how many times he fell asleep in Harry’s arms over the following days; all he could do was number his minutes by Harry’s heartbeat. When Harry was gone, rare as that was, the others would sneak in to update Cisco on Central City meta activity, interesting CCPD cases, or their tech frustrations. Harry would usually chase them out for talking business. Anytime they were all together in Cisco’s room, it was to bounce around theories on how best to wake him up as the swelling reduced. 

Although Cisco tried not to be discouraged by Caitlin’s diagnoses, there were only so many times he could hear that he should’ve woken up by now before incessant dread set in. It also didn’t help that the vibes he was getting from Harry, previously startlingly soft and achingly romantic, turned rapidly to fear and ire.

Days passed in scents of cheap takeout food, sounds of petty squabbles, and the feeling of Harry’s increasingly public displays of affection, including the morning Caitlin had to rouse him from where he’d slept, curled and cramped, on the limited mattress space next to Cisco. That was thrilling and new. Otherwise, the time was nebulous, monotonous.

Another surprise guest broke the cycle. Jesse Quick arrived with smiles and solutions. She pulled her dad away from Cisco for a few hours--Cisco tried not to begrudge the girl--and then she returned Harry with another Earth’s bounties.

The updated Cerebral Inhibitor wouldn’t wake Cisco up, but it would help him talk.


	3. Was there something I could've said to make it all stop hurting?

“I have no idea if you can hear me,” Harry murmured gently. His voice was raw from overuse. He pushed Cisco’s hair back, his hands lingering just a little too long on Cisco’s skin. “I suppose some part of me believes you do, or I wouldn’t keep coming back.” He laughed, the ghost of a breath sliding across Cisco’s face. “No. No, we both know that isn’t true.”

They were alone. If Cisco was awake, he’d have dragged Harry out of that chair and kissed him senseless. As it was, Cisco wasn’t sure Harry would have admitted those things if he was awake. He filed that away for later, though, and basked in the simple, surging warmth that was left over.

“Before everything happened, I modified the Cerebral Inhibitor 2.0 for… well, it doesn’t matter.” Harry cleared his throat. Cisco felt a smooth, skin-warmed tech device affix to his forehead.

_You re-engineered it to amplify and share thoughts, rather than block incoming ones. Clever, Harry. I should have thought of the original years ago when I had to put up with your nonsense every day. Blocked you out--_

“I’ll block you out,” Harry sneered reflexively.

“Didhejusttalktoyou?” There it was, the Flash _whoosh_. Cisco felt his hair fly against his face, and then Harry methodically replaced the strands.

Harry grunted into an evasive and very quiet “yes.”

_ Dude, you’re so jealous right now. _

“Shut up,” Harry growled.

_That’s really embarrassing,_ Cisco jeered, hoping laughter could be conveyed through the tech _. For you, I mean._

“I could easily smother you with--with this pillow, Ramon.”

_I’d like you to smother me with something else._

Harry’s jaw snapped open before he pulled it shut. The hurricane of emotions and thoughts that bombarded Cisco through the Inhibitor was too chaotic to decipher. He started to apologize, but Barry, puppy-dog, best-friend Barry, took safety scissors to Harry and Cisco’s fraught connection.

Barry ran to the unoccupied side of the bed. “I wanna try!”

“It’s only, um, only fitted for my brain wa--you know, if you put it on, your head could, uh--” Harry mimicked an explosion.

Hysterical giggles filled Cisco’s head. He kind of hoped Barry would challenge Harry just so he could listen to Harry argue his way out of that flimsy lie. But Barry retreated, probably with his suspicious face on.

“I’ll be in the speed lab with Nora,” Barry said. “Text me if anything changes.”

“Mmhm.”

Harry didn’t return once they were alone. He paced. Cisco pictured him pinching the bridge of his nose, his frown lines deepening, his fingers tapping against his table. His mind was a mess. Reaching into the divide, Cisco whispered, _Come back to me._

Harry listened. After slipping off his shoes and placing his glasses on the table, he folded himself into bed with Cisco. His arm was bent at an odd angle to accommodate their interlocked hands, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“For the record, it does.”

_Huh?_

“Your laughter. I could. Can. Hear it.” Harry reached out to vengefully tousle Cisco’s hair. “The Mad 2.0 can register more than speech.”

_ Can it fix my hair? _

“...You’re right. That was petty.”

_Oh? Oh? Harry Wells admitting he was wrong? Screw my miraculous recovery, because that was the real miracle!_

Harry made a gruff, unimpressed noise that lived between a cough and a growl. “It won’t be a miracle when you recover, Ramon. It’ll just be, you know, science.”

When Cisco didn’t immediately reply, Harry jostled him. The mattress creaked, their hands hooked tighter together, and Cisco forgot to worry for a second. But he had to say it. 

Quietly, Cisco prompted, _Suppose I don’t wake up._

“Don’t be an asshole.”

Cisco searched for the right words, which was considerably more difficult when hooked up to a device that literally streamed his consciousness into another person. He slowed down his output, creating a blank slate in his mind, imagining each thought as a scribble on his dry erase board.

_ No, I mean it. It’s a real possibility, right? Caitlin said so. In which case, I have a lot of things to say to you. Maybe get something to make a list, though, cause some of them are potential meta names. And yes, you can claim them as yours; that is my gift to you. _

Harry scoffed. “Absolutely not.”

_Aw, I’m touched. My legacy will live on._

“No, this. I’m not doing this. You’re going to wake up.”

Harry’s pulse quickened where their wrists connected. He was sending off signals of irritation, obstinance, but underneath it all, terror. The man acted tough, but they knew each other too well for Cisco not to see through it.

_Let me tell you something else, then_. _It’s good_ , he promised _. And you’ll never hear it if I wake up._

“When.”

_If._

“When, Ramon,” Harry corrected a little heatedly.

_You’re insufferable._

“Kettle, meet pot.”

_I hate you._

“You love me.”

The retort was almost flippant, the feelings coming through the connection tender and honest, until Harry realized what he’d said.

_Harry, I--_

Alarm surged in Harry’s mind like a tidal wave. Then, as soon as it appeared, it vanished. Cisco reached out and was greeted with darkness. Harry must have removed his half of the Mad 2.0.

That severance was brutal. Cisco felt exposed and afraid as he slipped into the earlier, blanker version of his comatose state. It was worse now that he’d come to rely so much on the Inhibitor; now he was just shouting into a void.

Fortunately, it didn’t last long. Harry crept back into his mind as if he was slowly readjusting the earpiece. His voice, gravelly and guilty, followed. “I’m sorry. I needed a minute.”

_That’s okay. I’m glad you came back._

“Me, too,” Harry replied. He let that linger, then cleared his throat. “You wanted to tell me something?”

_Don’t freak out again._

Harry shifted so he could rest his head on Cisco’s shoulder. He wound his arm around Cisco’s waist, bringing him as close as was safe.

_Okay, Romeo._

“I don’t--I don’t know who that is.”

_Are you serious?_

Harry smiled against Cisco’s neck. “Ramon.” 

_ Okay, okay.  _ Cisco really wished he could take a deep breath. Since that was impossible, he settled on a long pause before continuing,  _ I have this fantasy. _

Harry chuckled, the sound undercut by a faint hint of nerves. “Oh?”

Cisco would have given anything to see how Harry’s face looked in that moment.

“Like it always does,” Harry said. Cisco felt Harry’s lips against his temple. “No one’s around. Tell me.”

Cisco settled into his own mind, pulling up images he’d only allowed himself to construct in his apartment after long evenings alone in the lab with Harry. Harry, stepping out of a breach dressed in all black--combat boots, skinny jeans, a tight shirt, a leather jacket--glasses slightly askew and cheeks flushed.

_So you step out of the breach, and I’m there running calculations. Looking super_ _sexy, as usual._

Harry snorted.

_ Um, hello. My fantasy, listen up! Sexy as usual. You step out of the breach, all hot and bothered, and you grab my shirt, and slam me into the--I hear you knocking my edgy fantasy, cut it out--into the wall, Harry, like you’ve barely been suppressing this, right? And kiss me. Messy. Hands in my hair, thigh shoving up against my-- _

“Stop.”

_You said I could tell you this one!_

“I changed my mind.” Harry’s fingers gripped insistently at Cisco’s shirt collar. “Stop telling me. When you wake up, show me.” His breath was hot against Cisco’s neck. Cisco wanted to melt into him, wanted to feel that heat everywhere else.

_Being in a coma is hella inconvenient._

“Then wake up.”

_Look at that! Cured!_

Harry let out a long, purposeful breath. He pressed his forehead against Cisco’s. “You are going to wake up.”

They ditched the Mad pieces for a more peaceful night’s sleep. Cisco was better prepared for the separation when it happened; although unsettling, it was more like the pleasant farewell at the end of a date than the cold-bucket-of-water-dumped-on-his-head feeling it had been earlier.

Weakened by his long day, Cisco drifted off first. It was still dark when he opened his eyes.

_Wait._

Even the muted screen lights were blinding in the darkened medbay. Cisco’s pupils could barely adjust to the digital clock in front of him. It was 4:10am.

And he was awake.

Cisco gasped and sucked in way too much air. He grabbed uselessly at his chest as he tried to sit up, falling back down into a coughing fit. His muscles strained, fighting against the transition between weeks of rest to such violent movements. Sweat beaded on his forehead. The world spun and blurred and all the colors swirled into a kaleidoscope and he was going to be sick--

Two strong hands grabbed his shoulders, jostling him into reality. There came a sob mixed with laughter, and then Cisco was being pulled into a crushing hug, arms going slack at his sides as he was held.  


Everything was moving too fast. He shut his eyes to fight the nausea. The hug ended and there were sweaty palms on his face and neck, pressing, holding, checking his temperature and pulse, smoothing his hair down. Cisco reached out, expecting to find Caitlin and Barry and the whole team, but it was just Harry’s arm he touched.  


“Slow down. Please.” Cisco’s throat was raw, and he flinched when he swallowed.

Harry started to leave. “I’ll get water, call Caitlin--”

Cisco gripped Harry’s arm tighter. His skin was bare, cool. Laying his forehead against Harry’s shoulder, Cisco murmured, “Just stay.” The vowels were so slurred and disjointed that it would be a miracle if Harry understood.

Harry hummed, then dragged his knuckle down Cisco’s cheek. “Okay.”

Seconds stretched into an eternity as Cisco relaxed his breathing. He opened his eyes, glad to see the room had stopped spinning, and pulled back so he could look at Harry. His glasses were off, and his hair was sticking up all over the place. He was beautiful.

Cisco wanted to tell him that, but all that came out was, “You’re so annoying.”

A small laugh burst out of Harry’s lungs. “Am I?” he asked.

He plucked a strand of hair from Cisco’s forehead, twirling it around his finger as he bent forward. Their noses brushed. Cisco could smell mint toothpaste and stale scotch. He smiled, licked his lips, and doubled over into another coughing fit.

Harry maneuvered Cisco down and into his lap, where he half-laid, sputtering and swearing, while Harry rubbed soothing circles on his back.

Some air stayed in Cisco’s lungs long enough for him to talk. “Harry?” he urged.

“Yeah?”

“I could actually really use that water.”

Chuckling, Harry disentangled himself from Cisco and stood. Cisco painstakingly reorganized all the wires he was still attached to so he could do his best ‘draw me like one of your French girls’ impression. He strained to hold that pose while he admired Harry, who was turning on a few lights and rubbing the weariness from his eyes.

Harry yawned. Then he stretched, his tank top riding up over his hips. Cisco bit his lip and whispered, “Damn.”

And Harry, the absolute bastard, turned back around and _winked._

Cisco grinned, flopped onto his back, and tried not to think about how much effort those small movements had required. Despite his racing heart, his body was telling him to sleep more; Cisco fought a yawn and stared determinedly at the ceiling. He listened to Harry shuffle around the room. A cup hit the counter. The tap went on, off.

When Harry returned, he sat next to Cisco. “Hey. Ramon.” He spoke sternly, but his eyes were gentle, matching his hands as he placed each one on either side of Cisco’s head.

Cisco’s arms ached from overuse. Still, he found the strength to meet Harry halfway, clinging to his biceps and dropping his head into Harry’s shoulder. Harry grunted. Lifting Cisco’s chin with one finger, he muttered, “What are you doing?”

There were a million answers to that question.  _ Exactly what it looks like I’m doing. What I should have done as soon as I woke up.  _ If they’d kept the Mad 2.0 on, Cisco wouldn’t have to say it. Without the tech, though, he just smirked and surged forward to kiss Harry Wells.

His lips graced Harry’s cheek before glancing off into nothingness as Harry, at the last second, turned his face away. His skin was flushed. His lips were a single, thin line. He wouldn’t look at Cisco.

Eyes burning, Cisco shoved himself backwards with the little dignity he had left. He let his hair fall across his face, obscuring his vision, as Harry retreated. The silence was deafening.

It was broken three agonizing minutes later when heels clacked out of the elevator. The sound broke Cisco from a trance; he wiped tears away and glared at Harry.

“You texted Caitlin.”

It wasn’t a question, but Harry responded anyway--eyes distant and voice flat--with a detached, “Yeah.”

They didn’t speak again until morning.


	4. Would we be better off by now if I'd have let my walls come down?

Barry burst into the room, a flurry of excitement and what should have been infectious joy. Cisco plastered on a fake smile. Cailtin ran her round of afternoon tests while Barry nearly hugged Cisco to death.

Harry sat in his usual chair. He had stayed through every grueling exam, and although Cisco didn’t stop him, he didn’t welcome his presence, either. Only Caitlin, who was better attuned to frostiness than most, noticed the change between them.

Which, Cisco considered, was probably why she assigned the first PT assistant shift to Harry.

Team Flash modified the first floor of the Speed Lab for basic walking drills, stretching, and motor skills analysis. Cisco insisted he could walk there himself from medbay and ended up crashing halfway to the floor before Harry caught him. They separated quickly, Caitlin taking Cisco’s hand, but not before Caitlin frowned at the pair of them.

In her professional opinion, Cisco was recovering faster than she'd imagined. Still, she didn’t trust him to be alone with the equipment, and she preferred to observe and document, so Harry was forced to be the human buffer between Cisco and the--thankfully padded--floor.

Cisco could tell all Harry wanted to do was vanish into a corner to brood. He walked next to the ramp with his hands stuck under his armpits, occasionally reaching out to steady Cisco if he needed it. Cisco swatted him away each time.

Sweating, Cisco willed his knees to bend and carry him up the slight incline. He slipped, stumbled. Harry caught him, but his arms were barely around Cisco before Cisco pushed him. “I can do it myself!”

Harry sighed. “No, Ramon, you can’t.”

Cisco laid his forehead against the cold metal railing, his legs splayed next to him. Harry crouched close by, hovering. Cisco used to adore that. Now, it pissed him off. He swore and dragged himself to his feet. “You don’t get to care now,” he spat. “Doesn’t look like you wanna be here, anyway.”

“What?”

“You! Me! This!” Cisco pointed frantically between them. “All of a sudden, you’re here again? You wanna get close? Hold me?” His voice was high, verging on hysterical. “I’m tired--god, so tired of making moves and getting hurt and you swerving every. Damn. Time.”

Harry was quiet for a long time. He studied his shoes, then cleared his throat. When he first spoke, it was to Caitlin. “Can you give us the room?”

She nodded and left.

“I nev--mm. Hanging you on wasn’t--I didn’t mean to.”

Cisco rolled his eyes. “It’s ‘lead me on’ on Earth-1. And didn’t you? ‘Show me when you wake up, Cisco’; ‘I love you, too, Cisco’--or did you forget about that? ‘Cause, you can’t just drop a bomb--”

Harry flinched.

“ _Bomb_ , Harry, I’ll say it, ‘cause it hit _me_ , right! Not you. All you did was disappear.”

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Then what exactly _do_ you want to talk about, huh? You were just going to leave us all behind, that’s it?”

“I needed to see my daughter.”

“But were you ever going to come back?” Cisco lunged at Harry, shaking him by his shoulders. Weak as he was, he barely moved him. That made Cisco angrier. “Just answer me!” he yelled.

“I can’t.”

Cisco gripped Harry’s arms tighter, outrage expanding underneath his ribs until it hurt to breathe. “What the hell, Harry?”

Harry dropped his gaze, dropped Cisco’s face, dropped Cisco. He straightened, running his hands through his hair. His eyebrows were knit together and his entire body was drawn taut. “I just--not like--I don’t.” In an instant, he went from prowling around to a dead stop. “No,” he finally answered.

“Get out.”

Harry spun on his heels and stalked off. Barely a second later, Barry collided with Harry’s shoulder, halting them both. Caitlin skittered away from them, shrugging apologetically at Cisco as she hurried into the room and pretended to type something on the computer.

A confused laugh spilled from Barry as he steered Harry back toward Cisco. Harry resisted, and Barry frowned. “Dude, what’s up?”

Harry jerked his thumb at Cisco. “Ask him.”

Cisco’s face twisted. “I don’t want him here,” he managed through the lump in his throat.

Barry’s voice was infuriatingly soft. “Cisco. He’s been by your side this entire time, man.”

“No one asked him to stay!” The words ripped themselves out of Cisco’s lungs, and he rounded on Barry, tears threatening. “No one,” he added through gritted teeth.

It took Harry half an hour to pack his bags and breach back to Earth-2. Cisco was in his physical with Caitlin when Harry came to say goodbye to her. His eyes were red and puffy. Cisco looked away.

By the time he glanced at the door again, Harry was gone.

The next day, Cisco woke up, ate breakfast, and went to physical therapy. Every day after was the same. Rinse, repeat. Although it beat actually being in a coma, recovery was pretty awful. His arms and legs were frustratingly weak, his hair had lost some of its shine, and his powers wavered in tandem with his pitiful energy level. When he could finally walk on his own--and without supervision--he’d spend hours staring at the breach. Often his fingers would hover above the computers. Once he set the coordinates to Earth-2. Another time he dialed Harry.

He tore himself away from the console before he could make a huge mistake. What he needed was a distraction. Now that he was fully recovered, a new project was just what the doctor ordered.

Well, Caitlin didn’t order it. Cisco told her he was going to work on their security issues if he still wasn’t allowed in the field.

“Nothing strenuous,” she bargained.

“Deal.” They shook hands, smiling and giggling, and Cisco felt a little lighter than he had in a long time.

He didn’t go to his own lab, because he decided blasting Linda Ronstadt in The Lab Who Must Not Be Named was a perfectly legitimate way to move on. At the very least, it wasn’t a step in Ralph’s book. Cisco counted that as a win, even if his method was also not one of Caitlin’s recommended ‘healthy coping mechanisms.’

The Mad 2.0 had been unattended on the lab table. Thoughts of high-tech security cameras abandoned him, and Cisco decided to update that Inhibitor instead, occasionally pulling out Harry’s notes and completing equations and program designs that had been left unfinished. Eventually he stumbled across more personal notes.

_Ramon - lime juice in hair??_

_What is a ‘bulbasaur’?_

_Ramon - “The Princess Bride” - favorite movie?_

The most recent was on an otherwise blank page following a jumble of nonsense and semi-coherent mathematics. Cisco assumed it had been written on a bad day during the decline.

_Tell Cisco you love him_.

Cisco ran his thumb across the words. There came a familiar jolt in the back of his head, and then he was blinking into a vibe. In the vision, Harry sat in the same chair a couple inches from where Cisco sat in the present; Vibe-Harry was writing with one hand and hitting his forehead again and again with the other. Ink stained his skin, and he was gripping his pen too tightly. Each line drawn indented the page too deeply, marred it with a letter too dark. 

Vibe-Harry turned in his chair to talk to someone at the door. Cisco followed his gaze to another version of himself. Vibe-Cisco smiled at Vibe-Harry.

“What am I forgetting?” Vibe-Harry asked.

“Movie night,” Vibe-Cisco replied. He inclined his head at the myriad papers and blueprints. “You busy?”

Vibe-Harry shook his head. His eyes were so soft. Cisco couldn’t believe he’d failed to notice that look the first time.

“Let me just write down one more thing.” Vibe-Harry went back to his notes, where he wrote, much more delicately than the other sentences: _Tell Cisco you love him._

The vision ended as abruptly as it began. Cisco gulped, suddenly aware that he was crying. Footsteps sounded in the hallway and Cisco sniffled, wiping his eyes on the back of his hand before any more tears fell. He tossed Harry’s notebook away hastily, cranked the volume on _Por Un Amor_ , and started working on the closest device he could find.

“I thought you hated my music.”

Cisco’s head snapped up so fast he thought he’d have to ask Caitlin to treat him for whiplash.

Harry--and no, Cisco wasn’t vibing again, Harry, _his_ Harry-leaned against the open door frame wearing combat boots, black jeans, a tight black t-shirt, and a leather jacket. Cisco would have gasped if he could breathe. His chest ached like a fresh wound, and he leaned back in his chair, hands pressed together against his lips. His eyes slid across Harry’s face.

“Why are you here?”

Harry took a hesitant step forward. When Cisco didn’t object, he came even closer, throwing his bag at Cisco’s feet. “You.” The word was hardly more than a breath.

“You left me.” Cisco pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth and scoffed. “Twice.”

“I did. Shouldn’t have.”

Cisco swiped his hand down his face, groaning. “Fool me twice…” he murmured.

“Look,” Harry insisted, and Cisco did. “I can tell you how sorry I am, you can vibe it off me, or I can show you.”

“Wha--?”

Harry dropped to his knees beside his bag, staring up at Cisco from underneath his eyelashes. Cisco inhaled sharply. His mouth was paper-dry, his throat tight, his limbs heavy.

“Cisco.”

Cisco hummed in response.

“Tell me what you’re thinking.” Harry pressed his mouth to Cisco’s knee while he spoke, sending small reverberations up Cisco’s thigh.

He chewed his lip while he bumped Harry’s shoulder with his knee. “I’m thinking... it’s hard to be mad at you when you show up looking like that.”

Harry smiled, pulling at his shirt. “This little thing? Just something I slipped on.”

Cisco fought his grin and lost. He shook his head, saying, “It’s gonna take a lot more than Kirk quotes to make it up to me.”

“How ‘bout this?”

Harry cupped Cisco’s face gently, like Cisco might tell him to leave at any moment. Cisco met his gaze without hesitation. They stared at one another for the duration of a breath. Another. And then Harry leaned in, his eyes fluttering closed as he kissed the edge of Cisco’s lips, the bridge of his nose, just under his eye. His lips lingered on Cisco’s cheek, casting shallow breaths onto his skin. Harry pushed Cisco’s hair back behind his ears before flattening his palms against the sides of Cisco’s neck and pressing his thumbs to Cisco’s jaw.

Cisco tilted his head, bumping their noses together. He closed his eyes. And he kissed Harry.

Harry, brow furrowing, lifted Cisco fully out of his chair and pressed him against the desk. Cisco wrapped his arms around Harry’s shoulders, and they fit together so naturally Cisco felt lightheaded. He smiled against Harry’s lips. “Keep it up and I’m gonna start thinking you’re a big softie.”

“Shut up and kiss me, Cisco.”

Cisco’s gasp turned into an open-mouthed moan as Harry slotted his thigh between Cisco’s legs. Harry took the opportunity to slide his tongue against Cisco’s, who contemplated--as he shifted back onto Harry’s desk, sending tools and metal pieces crashing to the floor--if it was medically possible to pass out from sheer, delirious happiness.

“You’re being loud,” Cisco admonished insincerely.

“ _You’re_ being loud.”

Cisco planted a trail of kisses along Harry’s neck and jaw, and then bit his ear. Hard. “You wish I was being loud.”

“Heck yeah I do,” Harry growled.

Cisco was struck with the thought of acting out his own _When Harry Met Sally_ scene, and barely suppressed a giggle.

Harry cocked his head. “Why are you shaking?”

Cisco patted Harry’s cheek and grinned. “Heh, I’m laughing at you.” When Harry started his adorably dorky sputtering, Cisco laughed harder, and then pulled him back in for a deep kiss.

“Hey Cisco, I know you miss him, but we don’t actually need another Harry to throw things around the la--uh.”

“Hey, Iris.” Licking his lips, Cisco stared at the wall next to her head, heat creeping into his face. Harry stood frozen in place--thigh still pressed up against Cisco’s semi, hands pressing into his hips, fingers sneaking under his shirt--, his eyes wide with panic.

Iris’ eyebrows crept higher on her forehead. “I, um. _Also_ came to tell you we had a breach alert, but I guess the warning’s not necessary.”

“Mmhm. Mmhm, mmhm.” Cisco squeezed his eyes shut, willing the moment to be over.

Iris clapped her hands together, backing out of the lab. “I’m just gonna go now.”

“Nice to see you, Ms. West-Allen,” Harry said, overlapping Cisco’s less-than-friendly, “Okay! Bye!”

“You--you, too,” Iris called back, nearly tripping up the stairs while she made her graceless exit.

“Think she’s gonna tell everybody?”

“Yup.”

“Think we better get up there?”

“Yup. But real quick--” Cisco grabbed Harry’s shirt and pulled him in for a final kiss, sliding their lips together slowly and lingering on Harry’s taste. He hummed proudly when he opened his eyes and Harry’s were still closed, still lost in the moment.

They took some time to cool off by getting everything back on the desk, Cisco purposefully misplacing things so Harry would grumble and fix them. Once everything was where it belonged, they made their way toward the stairs. Cisco held out his hand. “I was thinking you could stick around for good this time.”

Harry smiled--genuine and warm, eyes crinkling at the corners--and took Cisco’s hand.

“As you wish.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can find us on tumblr @ithappensoffstage , or on Twitter as @dykeoftomorrow (dykeannebonny) and @JasEdwards13 (ThirdActLove)!
> 
> This work now features a stunning illustration we commissioned from @harrison-x-cisco on Tumblr. Check out their work and give them all the love they deserve!


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